The Piper is a source for official Carnegie Mellon news from the Internal Communications Department. Published monthly during the academic year, the Piper includes stories about university research, the people who make that research happen, the students we all support, and the events and activities that make this university and its branch locations a vibrant place to live, work and learn.

March

With 16 months still to go in Carnegie Mellon's Inspire Innovation campaign, CMU has crossed the $1 billion milestone. But the campaign is not over yet.

"The success of Inspire Innovation is a testament to the loyalty and generosity of our alumni, faculty, staff, parents, students and friends," said University President Jared L. Cohon. "They believe in us deeply, and they've demonstrated it through their support of the campaign."MORE

Pittsburgh's City Council celebrated the School of Music with a proclamation declaring Feb. 28, 2012, as "The Carnegie Mellon School of Music Day." The event recognized the 100th anniversary of the School of Music.MORE

Martin Gaynor, the E.J. Barone Professor of Economics and Health Policy at the Heinz College, focuses his research on competition in health care markets and on the role of incentive structures within health care. Gaynor is the chairman of the governing board of the recently launched Health Care Cost Institute, an unprecedented health research initiative that will allow researchers and policymakers access to a comprehensive collection of health plan and government payer data to offer new insights into health care costs, utilization and intensity.MORE

The students sitting in lectures at CMU for a new iPad programming course are just the very tip of the iceberg. "Developing iPad Applications for Visualization and Insight" has proved popular with students from across the university and the world. About 90 students showed up for the first day of class though the course had enrolled its limit of 30. And more than 20,000 subscribers are watching class lectures for free at Carnegie Mellon on iTunes U.MORE

Michael W. Twitty, served up okra soup, black-eyed peas and leafy greens with a side of history. In his talk, "More Than Slave Food: The African Roots of American Foodways," the culinary historian discussed food's critical role in the development and definition of African-American civilization and the politics of consumption and cultural ownership.MORE

You don't need to go to Sundance to see the best independent films of the year. CMU's International Film Festival is bringing two of the famed festival's 2012 winners, along with an array of other acclaimed films, to Pittsburgh.MORE

Art is about experimenting and testing limits. Future Tenant, a downtown Pittsburgh art space, keeps that in mind as an arts management training laboratory managed completely by students. It's been that way for a decade.MORE

A gym floor cordoned off into pipe-and-draped booths stuffed with employers. Hordes of students dressed up in their finest, gripping their resume-filled binders, their eyes darting around the room in search of employers that might be hiring a person with their skills, and with their 30-second self-promotional elevator pitch rehearsed and at the readyMORE

Carnegie Mellon is taking its entrepreneurial expertise abroad. A new pilot Entrepreneurship-in-Residence program at Carnegie Mellon Portugal, created in partnership with the University Technology Enterprise Network, recently brought four Portuguese companies to Pittsburgh to help them extend their businesses to the U.S.MORE

Two U.S. cabinet members and the president of the World Bank visited campus in February. U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu met with students at an event hosted by the Tepper Energy Club. Discussion topics with Chu, a Nobel laureate in physics, ranged from smart grid technologies to the future of the nuclear industry post-Fukushima.MORE

The winner of the 2011 Dickson Prize in Science, Marvin L. Cohen, is one of the most influential condensed matter physicists in the world. His work has impacted important fields including nanotechnology and materials science, and has helped to explain superconductivity — something that Einstein thought might never be explained.MORE